Cruisers Who Fail...

[Boracay]

In terms of keeping the going free from distraction I find my "old" SD Topfield PVR invaluable.

Now, if the big game (That's AFL to all yous non believers) is going to interfere with my rebuild (or even worse, "sailing") I simply tell the machine to record it for me.

I'm even starting to wonder if I could take it cruising with me ...

[MarkJ]

Originally Posted by Christian Van H

To save us the trouble, could you just tell us the secret?

Originally Posted by sneuman

Apparently by thinking positive thoughts you attract positive "energy" or some sort.

Originally Posted by sneuman

Yeah, its that sort of stuff thats all hogwash...
It needs translating back into real words.

First is setting the correct goals.
"Hey I want to be rich!" Being rich is only a facilitator to what you really want. What is that thing that would make you happy? I always thought "When I was rich I would go sailing". Sometimes I would look at a photo of a $5M Oyster and say 'If I get rich I'll go sailing on that'
The Secret says don't worry about the 'rich' or 'that boat' just focus on your ultimate goal: I want to go sailing.

If then I focus totally on my goal, NOT 'I'm going sailing', but 'I'm going sailing now' and being totally immersed in planning to go sailing NOW

The Secret says that if you are totally immersed in your goal (dream, call it whatever) you attract positive energy.
My experience is that when totally immersed in the goal our mind creatively thinks of ways to achieve it and how to get around barriers: the barriers do seem to fall away.
OK, I can't do the Oyster, but thats not a real part of the dream, the real part is to go sailing NOW so what boat can I afford to go NOW.

This energy from the universe crap is just your mind being more open about it: you meet someone who is into sailing and automatically they become your best friend because your mind is sapping up their knowledge. You join forums like this and dump facebook, and the dating website, your next GF is from a sailing club because you just joined the sailing club and are 'out there' happy and asking questions - chics dig that. At work you have a boat on your desk and after a few months the others in the office say: Theres Mark planning his big cruise! Mark we really want to visit you in Santorini! WOW!

Over a period of time your all consuming goal starts mucking around with 'time' itself! I'm going sailing in 2 years... all of a sudden you realise if I cut this, or do that it will be 23 months, I do this and its 20 months!

From when I saw The Secret it was 12 months EXACTLY before we flew out of Australia and bought a boat 10,000 miles away and were standing on her deck.



My LIFE LONG DREAM WAS ACHEIVED IN ONE YEAR!!!!!!!

Is it because of The Secret or good goal setting?
I have studied a bit of business management and know about good goal setting, but The Secret made me change the parameter of my goal to the ultimate life goal.

Now, back to this thread: What happens if my life goal changes? Then set another course and pluck it down!

When we have done sailing we want to get a farm and have lots of pets we can't have here. I have never been a farmer. Can I do it? YES!!!!!!!!! When? After my sailing goal has been achieved

Mark

[Christian Van H]

Originally Posted by MarkJ

When we have done sailing we want to get a farm and have lots of pets we can't have here.

Great... a hamster and gerbil farmer.

[James S]

Sounds to me like the secret is to focus and work hard to achieve your goal.
(the real secret is to put it in on a disc and sell a million of them)
I've always been served well by honestly believing I can achieve X and visualizing it.....ok day dreaming....I said it!
But put that together with my first sentence and its a winning combination.

Not to loose track of the thread
I wonder how many people chose to cruise as a form of “transportation” to far off places.
I’m fortunate to travel a lot…so I get to see the people and places and experience other cultures….so for me the idea of cruising has little to do with transportation…its more like play.
I can see people getting put off by cruising if they think it’s a cheap and easy way to get from point A to point B……
Just thinking out loud!

[MarkJ]

Originally Posted by Christian Van H

Great... a hamster and gerbil farmer.

Great idea! Now my farm can be smaller! Thats affordable! See how The Secret works?!

[MarkJ]

Originally Posted by James S

Sounds to me like the secret is to focus and work hard to achieve your goal.

No James. The idea is to focus on your goal. The to acheive your goal you may have to work hard. Theres a difference


Mark

[ato]

Originally Posted by Ocean Girl

Never met anyone that just stopped cruising cause they didn't like it.

Erika

mostly true, and still there are exceptions. people who, while cruising, came across this nice place where they decided to build a house and settle down for a while. Langkawi (Malaysia) has a few such cases that i know of. i'm not sure whether there are other circumstances that made this decision easier on them. will be there next week and ask them.

[Christian Van H]

Originally Posted by MarkJ

No James. The idea is to focus on your goal.

Here's my true "secret" story: A couple of years ago I started working on an invention. Thoughout the process I would often envision the day when I would unveil my invention (an electronic musical percussion instrument) before a manufacturer and it would be an instant hit. I finished the prototype, got a provisional patent and weaseled my way to get a meeting with the head of product development for a large electronic instrument manufacturer. The day came, he met me in the lobby and we grabbed a meeting room. I demonstrated my goods, he went gaga, and called in the chief designer. HE called in the vice president, who in turn called in the president. You cant imagine a better meeting in all your life. I blew them away. I left there on cloud nine, certain we would soon be striking a deal. One week later they simply said "no".

I'm not religious, I'm not superstitious, and I still cant tell you what the F happened. I can tell you that when I envisioned that day, I never really conjured anything up after that meeting. Nothing. The meeting was everything to me because I thought it was the most important part of the whole process. Would things have been different had I envisioned selling thousands of units and having the money to sail forever? What do you think?
There, I've never told anyone this before. Hope you're happy, Chris

[MarkJ]

Originally Posted by Christian Van H

Would things have been different had I envisioned selling thousands of units and having the money to sail forever? What do you think?

Yes.
Because you were focused on ONE meeting. If you were just focused on selling the product you would have realised you may need 100 meetings with 100 companies before you could find 2 that both wanted it and wanted it desperately!

I have done the same where I went to the biggest company to sell and idea. The other 5 I never saw as I was defeated by the first company.

Same as the goal to go sailing is totally differnt to making money. One you might sell your article at a price higher so you can buy a winch; the other you may sell at a lower price because its better for business - you'll have a customer for life. But who wants a customer for life?

[Alaska JD]

This has been and interesting thread on "failure" of dreams. Quite wide ranging in fact. As a therapist I spend a lot of time helping people learn how to fail successfully - that is learn not how to repeat the same mistake. Only in that way is failure not a failure. I too look forward to retiring in a few years and living wherever the dream and live takes my wife and I - practicing successful failure. That perspective makes life a lot more exciting and resiliant

[GordMay]

"It has always seemed strange to me,' said Doc. 'The things we admire in men, kindness and generosity, openness, honesty, understanding, and feeling are the concomitants of failure in our system.
And those traits which we detest, sharpness, greed, acquisitiveness, meanness, egotism, and self-interest are the traits of success.
And while men admire the quality of the first, they love the produce of the second."

John Steinbeck, Cannery Row

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Christian Van H

You are quite right, Paradix. Now that I look back on it, Failure was probably not a good choice. I cant change the thread title now, but we are on the same wavelength. Example: A husband and wife work and save for years to buy the "perfect" catamaran for their retirement cruise. They take off from the East Coast, and by the time they get to the V.I.s he or she has had enough. They thought it could last forever, but it was over in 8 months. Failure? Not really, but a story I'd like to hear the particulars of...

I don't know; I thought the topic as originally stated was interesting. I do some teaching at business schools using the case method; the cases on projects or ventures which were failures are 10x more useful, contain 10x more instructive lessons, than the ones on projects or ventures which were successes.

It's difficult to get anyone to write that kind of case, however, for all the same reasons discussed here.

[estarzinger]

Originally Posted by Christian Van H

Where are the couple's stories who saved and dreamed, only to have a miserable time and soon packed it in? ... We would be interested in hearing some of those experiences

It's an interesting thread - explores some of the 'human equation' in cruising which is (IMHO) more critical to success than all the normal gear discussions.

We have known quite a few people who have packed it in at various stages.

There is a relatively large group of people who just can't get the boat together - unrealistic budgeting (both money and time commitment), lack of the ability to say 'NO" to all the gadgets sold as 'essential/must have". For some of thee people, their 'real' objective was just to putter around with the boat anyway, and actually leaving was never in the real cards. But for some, they really tried hard and intended to go cruising, but just fail at the project management skills necessary to get off - and some of these lose a significant portion of their financial assets in the process.

There is a group that do get off but have a terrible first passage (surprisingly common - happened to us) and just never regain their self-confidence and turn around.

There is a group who thought cruising was going to be a retirement vacation and discover its harder work than working.

There is a group who thought cruising was about travel and discover you may sail to exotic locations but often they are too busy fixing the boat or worried about the anchorage to do much sightseeing inland.

There is a group who find it boring and unrewarding - mostly people who want/like more social group interaction and/or intellectual stimulation.

There is a group for whom want to continue cruising but 'events overtake' - parents/children get into trouble back home, the financial markets crash and their money disappears, health problems develop, etc.

There used to be a widely repeated 'saying' that 1 in 10 people with the dream get the boat, 1 in 10 with the boat leave the dock, 1 in 10 that leave the dock make a first long passage and 1 in 10 that make the first passage keep going. That makes the dream to life style conversion rate = 1 in 1000. That's obviously just a swag, but there is some truth to it.

One thing that has always interested me is that it is very hard to guess who will "make it" and who will not. "nurses" and school teachers for some reason seem to have a high success rate. But other than that, prior occupation does not seem to be correlated with 'success'. Neither does wealth.

[sailorboy1]

I may have missed some of the posts in the middle of this. But I wonder if the 'Goal' itself is the problem for lots of people (and since I am still a few years away I'm no expert). I read lots of stories where it seems people are sailing on some schedule etc because they just "have" to get somewhere as it is the big plan. While I definitely hope to see and do certain things, my cruising plan is basically "nowhere to be a no schedule to get there".

[Ocean Girl]

Originally Posted by estarzinger

One thing that has always interested me is that it is very hard to guess who will "make it" and who will not. "nurses" and school teachers for some reason seem to have a high success rate. But other than that, prior occupation does not seem to be correlated with 'success'. Neither does wealth.

Very interesting, I didn't know that. Maybe its because if you can get through nursing school, you can get through anything. One of the few times in my life when I thought that my 110%, my best, might not be good enough. Funny, now that I say that, there are times I still think that. Though I did my best, it may not of been good enough for my patient. Sorry thread drift.

On topic - ever since setting the goal for OG in Australia by 2012, the projects aboard are really ticking away. The practical side of me can't see how I will get it all done and get the money saved. But the dreamer in me can't shake the image of Ocean Girl sailing in the blue waters of the Pacific. I know that is not a very "scientific" approach, but I do know that the dreamer in me usually wins, that is how I got through nursing school.

Erika